Thursday, July 17, 2008

Apple this morning sent an e-mail apologizing to customers of its MobileMe service who experienced a tough few days. And to soothe ruffled feelings, Apple said it would extend their MobileMe subscription by a month.

MobileMe is Apple's new service that keeps your contact information, e-mails, etc. up to date across all your devices, including the iPhone and computers. MobileMe replaces Apple's .Mac service. The full letter to MobileMe customers can be found on an Apple discussion group here.

Bill Evans, a spokesman for Apple, confirmed the news, which was reported this morning by Macworld and Engadget. He would not say how many people were affected.

"The .Mac to MobileMe transition was a lot rockier than we had hoped, but everything is now up and running," he said. "We want to apologize to our loyal customers and express our appreciation for their patience by giving all current subscribers an automatic 30-day extension to their MobileMe subscription free of charge."

The apology comes days after Apple struggled with its iPhone 3G launch. On Friday, some people who downloaded the company's free software update to their older iPhones found the device rendered unusable. And those waiting for the iPhone 3G outside stores around the world saw lines stall as activation of the new devices through Apple's iTunes periodically came to a halt.

The MobileMe and iPhone problems are part of the company's "teething troubles," said Shiv Bakhshi, an analyst at the research firm IDC. "Apple is trying to enable a connected universe, and the greater the number of nodes, the more the opportunity for failure, which means more testing and working out the bugs becomes critical."